As is our normal practice when the family gathers in the Lakes, we all walk, somewhere. In the past we’ve been up Barrow (twice), Silver How, around Grasmere and Easedale Tarn. This walk usually involves my auntie, uncle and cousins coming up from St Helens to join in. This was no exception as my cousins…
So we visited Lancaster the day before and arrived in the Lakes to stay in the old Thorney How youth hostel in Grasmere, a place big enough for the 16 of us on our yearly family holiday north. I’m not certain how many more of these we will get as the kids grow up (mine…
2025 felt like a long year and we’ve definitely been busy, with some walking, lots of work done setting up the new house and garden and some nice trips away as well. As with previous years I’ll start with the review and look later at what’s in store for 2026 with some exciting stuff planned.…
The last walk of our Lake District break before we were due to head off to Liverpool, for a couple of days sightseeing. The weather was still superb but we were still feeling the effects of two longer walks, earlier that week. We’d also got used to being a little lazy in the morning, so…
So the main reason we were away in late September, was a birthday for myself, one with an 0 in it (yes you are all correct I don’t look 40 do I? 😁). After two big walks around Coledale and Newlands, we were a bit knackered. Our legs knew what they should be doing but…
You wait all year for a horseshoe and two come along in consecutive days!! After completing the Coledale Horseshoe the day before, we headed out again on another glorious day to complete the Newlands version. We were taking advantage of the stunning weather, despite some stiff legs and we figured we could take our time…
After our drizzly walk over Ling Fell the previous day, we’d looked closely at the weather. Unbelievably it was forecast to clear, not just for one day but the rest of the week, bingo! Being in the northwest corner of the Lakes, gave us great access to the fells around Braithwaite and it was there…
So the first proper day of our holiday in the Lakes, done to celebrate a birthday with an 0 in it for myself. Unfortunately the drizzly weather had followed us to the Lakes, and as you saw, from the fields around our previous walk to Scout Scar, they’d had rain up here as well (that…
It had been 13 months since our last visit to the Lake District, when I completed my 214 Wainwright mission. This time we had the advantage of picking walks that we wanted to do, revisits to good places, seeing some summits that I’d had no views from previously and taking our time. The weather for…
This post was something that I had thought about when I got that 10 year anniversary message earlier this year, I’d also passed 750,000 hits on the site as well, so I thought that I should do a celebration post to mark the event. Its true that I started in 2015, mainly out of a…
I said at this point last year that 2023 had “passed in the blink of an eye”, well I’m not sure I even managed to get a blink in, and 2024 was gone. So here I am typing up what happened throughout last year. As with previous years I’ll start with the review and look…
I wanted to write something about my Lake District journey, sharing what I’ve enjoyed and some bits that I’d preferred to have missed. This might be a long post but then again I am cramming 14 years and 92 walks into one post. This would include my favourite walks and fells, some of the underrated…
So when you’ve completed a list of something, what do you do next. Well I suppose you look to do it all over again. I’m not one of those people that has to wait until list one is finished, before you can start counting list two summits. So I’ve already been up Helvellyn a couple…
So this was it, 14 years, 30 visits to the Lakes, around 24,000 miles driven and 91 walks. It all boiled down to this final walk, which would be number 92 and would take me to almost 540 miles of walking to bag all of them. Lots of people leave an easier fell to finish…
So having walked Blencathra and Mungrisdale Common the day before, we look to sort out a gentler walk from the house. My auntie, uncle and cousin were also coming up from St Helens to visit for the day, so we decided on a walk around one end of Derwent Water, straight from our doorstep. My…
So it was time to get on with the walks that would finally finish off my Wainwright 214 journey. For some reason I hadn’t done Blencathra, despite it being Wainwright’s most written about fell, and the one with the most ascent routes. It had certainly been one that I’d thought about the most, and when…
So here I am, potentially my last visit to the Lakes to bag new fells from the Wainwright 214 list. I needed just two walks to finish off the list, and join the ever expanding number of members, who have completed them all. Not that this is planned as my final ever visit, if all…
After a day around Ambleside we headed off to bag my last Southern fell, in Grey Friar. I’d looked at various routes up to Grey Friar and done a couple of walks of the Coniston Fells that could have taken it in, but in the end it was left as a solo fell, needing to…
Between the four walks we did on this visit to the Lakes, we had a look around and visited a few places that I’ve never been to before, and always thought it would be good to see. Considering we were near to Skelwith Bridge you’d have though that Skelwith Force would be on the agenda,…
So with ticking off Catstycam and Birkhouse Moor, I’d completed Wainwrights 204 and 205. Now for numbers 206 and 207. This started with a drive over Wrynose Pass, not so bad in drying weather and along the valley to Cockley Beck, before a left turn to Birks Bridge. The car park was fairly empty as…
Well this would be my penultimate drive to the Lakes, in order to bag the Wainwrights, on my way to the ultimate 214 total. Around 400 miles of driving before a step was taken. You’d think that sort of drive would put me off walking when I got there, errr no, it didn’t and doesn’t!…
So that was 2023 gone in the blink of an eye and we all start to look at walks and places to visit for 2024. I’ll save talking about 2024 for lower down in this post and first look back at 2023, which will go down as one of my best walking years with plenty…
So our last walk of this visit to the Lake District and our 5th one. Only one walk (the Scafell Pike one) had been a little disappointing. What would this one bring us? The weather was set, as it did on Scafell two days before, to clear as the day went on, hopefully clearing the…
For our week in the Lake District we had managed to secure a little terraced cottage in the grounds of Irton Hall, the important thing about this cottage was its location on the edge of Wasdale. When we weren’t enjoying the delights of walking the fells of Wasdale, we also had one day of heavy…
Having summited the highest Wainwright and mountain in England two days earlier, we figured that we would also summit the second highest. This was a walk made to shorten the number of walks I have left, by one at least, and as a result I conjured up the longest walk I’ve done on any of…
Day 3 in the Lakes and 3 walks already, after yesterday with a long walk of 12 miles but not too much steep walking, today was different. A short walk of only 6 miles but a never ending staircase trudge both up and down. The only break from the constant line of people heading up…
Day 2 and walk number two for us. This was the day of the Coronation and we expected the fells to be a little quieter. Not so, even on this side of the Lake District where seeing other people can be a novelty, the place was fairly busy. And not just with humans, first the…
Another visit to the Lakes and another long drive north setting off early (5am). The reason for the early start is to try and squeeze a walk in on arrival, thus starting our week away on the right foot, plus ticking off a Wainwright which I needed from my list. Last time we walked up…
Well 2022 has passed into the annals of history and we all start to make plans for 2023, I will mention some of my plans for this year lower down but for now lets look back at 2022. It started with lots of coastal walks, in fact I’d only done one walk on Dartmoor by…
Our last walk in the Lakes for this week and finally we hit a day were the rain had stopped. At least for our location anyway. There was plenty of blue skies between the clouds, and a strong breeze was making sure those clouds moved quickly across the sky. There were rain showers but luckily…
After a couple of walks where we had needed some serious ‘clothes drying by the fire’ at the end of the walk, you’d have thought we would avoid a weather forecast that said strong winds up to 60mph and heavy and persistent rain with cloud cover down on the high and medium fells. But when…
After two fell walks and a day in the pub we needed a lower walk (plus a lie in). I’ve been wanting to add on Rydal Water to my normal Grasmere loop and this was the day. We started out after lunch and after the rain had eased a little. The rain stopped as we…
Day 2 for us in the Lakes and a decision to be made, walk from the house or scoot around to the Gale Road car park and head up to Skiddaw Little Man. The former won the vote due to a late start and therefore no need to worry about parking anywhere, we were heading…
November and a week booked in the Lakes. Not normally a choice for many but the hardiest of walkers. I’ve been quite a few times now in the half term at the end of October, this time we chose the second week in November. I figured that the 2 weeks won’t make too much difference,…
Well this was certainly the hottest I’d experienced in the Lake District in the 14 years that I had been coming up. Temperatures touching 30-35 degrees were being seen around the area. Places to swim rather than fells to walk were the order of the day. We were staying 10 mins walk from Derwent Water…
So this was the first real walk in the Lakes on this holiday, it was the day after the wedding, so we weren’t really up and at it first thing. Still we left the house around 10am to head across the Whinlatter Pass to the parking which is roadside along the side of Loweswater. Booted…
Time for one last walk on the penultimate day, the weather all week had been getting better and better with lots of sunshine. With only one patch of rain/drizzle, which happened to be from midnight until about 8am on the Monday. It had been a good weather week and it had been too good not…
Post 4 from the Easter trip to the Lake District. With two posts of big walks, firstly Yewbarrow, Scoat Fell and Haycock, followed by Eagle Crag around to Ullscarf. This walk is a mix of days, the weather continued to stay kind, with lots of blue and some nice evening sunsets. The first batch of…
Not sure why I picked this walk straight after the last one. Looking at ascents up a fell, Yewbarrow and Eagle Crag are two of the most fearsome in the district. From my list I’m only missing Sharp Edge on Blencathra and I’d have had a hattrick on this holiday. Now here comes a warning,…
First of the big walks on the Easter visit to the Lakes this year. My Wainwright map has far too many dots in the south western side, particularly around Eskdale and Wasdale. Time for a visit out that way. Now some would say that heading to Wasdale on an Easter Sunday is asking for trouble,…
Grasmere is a walk I’ve done lots of times in the Lakes, alongside that of Aira Force probably, it might even get close to my favourite walk here in the South West (Cadover Bridge to Shaugh Bridge) with the number of visits. Considering its 400 miles away it’s a fair effort, but then considering I’ve…
Well 2021 has now passed and we can all start to make plans for the new year, I will get around to mentioning my plans lower down but for now lets look back at 2021. It started badly for the first 3 months with lockdown and the dreaded words “a short drive”. I had no…
The day after my mountain walk around Esk Hause, the weather was slowly taking a turn for the worse, I decided to make the most of the next day of maybe some drizzle but mainly low cloud. Aira Force is always a great outing for bad weather days, plenty of waterfalls and a nice loop…
The big walk for this visit to the Lakes (apologies for the large amount of photos!), this was a bit of a concoction of fells thrown together to make a loop and pick off a load of Wainwrights. These fells would normally mean a couple of walks to pick them off, and all requiring a…
This is a regular walk when I head north to the Lake District, and a simple one at that. I really ought to include Rydal Water in the loop and walk back via the coffin route and make a bit more of it. However today the weather was a bit gloomy, cloud was down and…
After the visit to hospital I knew that my youngest needed to rest this holiday, so we had a couple of days just mooching around the house and Grasmere and doing very little. By Friday I wanted to walk again, however the weather had turned a bit and the fine weather of earlier in the…
Its taken a bit to get round to writing this post, a walk to one of the great mountains in the Lakes and picking up a few other Wainwrights on the way around, with any luck. The walk is a very good one and is a change from the previous walks on this holiday (Carrock…
After our first walk in the Lakes in nearly two years, we sweltered in a heatwave the next day. We therefore decided to walk after tea in the evening for our second outing. This would hopefully give us a slightly cooler walk and meant the fell needed to be reasonably near to the house in…
Well, finally, we could make our way to the Lakes to stay for a holiday. One Covid cancellation and one burst water pipe in the holiday cottage, had meant that the last time I set foot in Lakeland was October 2019. Which is far too long ago for me. Those that say that the hills…
The title is a nod to the director of the 7up series of Tv programmes, Michael Apted who has died recently, he was also known for Gorillas in the Mist. The title is relevant as the website has hit a quarter of a million views (approaching 100,000 individual visitors). The numbers are mind-blowing for me…
Well 2019 has been a tumultuous year. I lost a job, spent 6 months unemployed, struggled with anxiety and depression during that time. Starting volunteering with the National Trust, then got a new job with the National Trust. Got huge pains throughout my arms and hands doing the ranger volunteering work that I was doing,…
Such a good walk this one, if you have National Trust membership then start from the main car park beside the lake, something I try to use in lots of car parks up here. If not then there is another car park to the west just off the road to Coniston. Either way this is…
I had a choice of a few walks for this day, I could head to Great Gable or maybe pick off some behind Skiddaw. But this time I decided to finish off the Far Eastern Fells. This is my first book of the Wainwright’s that I have finished and one that I thought would be…
Another visit to the Lakes for me and this was a walk that I actually came up with myself, looking at the Far Eastern fells I had left, this walk seemed possible on the map. When I looked online this turned out to be a Longsleddale Round, plus Selside Pike. For some reason this fell…
After three walks in three days we had a couple of days off, with a pootle around Ambleside on one day, followed by a trip to Keswick for some present shopping the next. We were ready for our next walk. The strange thing about this walk was that we discussed it 12 months ago when…
In between the walking days in our week in The Lakes, we had a couple of days off. One was spent pottering around Ambleside in the rain. The second was a trip to Keswick to buy a few presents and have some lunch up there. Considering we were staying in Grasmere, it is normally is…
This was our 3rd walk in 3 days, and surprisingly our longest. The walk out to Calf Crag is much further than it looks on a map, however the path we took meant that the distance was just a sideshow. Greenburn Bottom is a gem of a place and will easily go in my top…
Day 2 dawned and again the weather was dry. Not quite as sunny as it was the day before, however with the cloud off the tops you have to make the most of it in the Lake District. The plan was to grab two southern fells just off the Wrynose Pass, now I’m sure there…
Our week in the Lakes arrived and with it the possibility of some changeable weather. To be honest we did pretty well, looking at the forecast the first 3 days would be good, so out we went for 3 walks. Then a day of rain followed by a mixed bag, where we got one more…
I wasn’t sure whether to write anything about this, however it is a bit of a milestone for the blog and website so I figure a thank you is needed to you, the readers. Thank you all, from the humble beginnings of a newly emerging Dartmoor tor or rocky outcrop this website has become a…
This walk wasn’t on the plan for this holiday, I’d originally wanted to do Yolk, Ill Bell, Froswick and Troutbeck Tongue, however the long drive put me off, so I changed to this one. Talk of a horseshoe walk in the Lake District and you will get quite far down the list before someone mentions…
This is probably a walk that I have looked at for 5 years or more now, each time I’ve put it off and gone elsewhere. I’ve added parts to it and then taken them away, I’ve even changed my starting point at the last minute. Originally this was going to be a walk out of…
Another week in the Lakes and it coincided with some lovely weather which got warmer as the week went on. Before heading up to the Lakes I hadn’t had my usual long walk to get me ready for walks with steep fells over long distances, I am a fan of the Dartmoor landscape but it…
Staying in Coniston means that the Old Man is an ever present sight every day. Both myself and my boys had climbed The Old Man of Coniston before back in 2014. I wanted to keep my run of Wainwrights ticking along and wasn’t keen on going up fells that I’ve done before. However the Old…
Since I had started walking in The Lakes I had in mind a number of routes, paths and edges that have to be tried or at least looked at. The names of these places will be familiar to a lot of people, places like Striding Edge, Sharp Edge and the Corridor Route are all very…
Our annual family Lake District week was here and true to form coincided with a change in weather in this area. Talk in the run up weeks was of hot temperatures and hosepipe bans, on arrival we could see lots of lakes and tarns with very low levels of water. We had, had one previous…
After the Tuesday walk up around High Street I was pretty drained. The heat was tough to walk in and to make matters worse the breeze that was present in the Lake District had completely disappeared on the Wednesday. Thursday arrived and the haze was pretty thick, I had planned on a route that took…
Three days into the holiday and no proper walk for me so far, but the hot weather up here in The Lakes had held me back. Tuesday looked good, the temperature said it would drop a few degrees but the sun would still be out. It was off to Hartsop to do a walk that…
Firstly may I wish everyone a Happy New Year, I hope 2018 brings you all some great walking weather. 2017 has been a pretty good year for me and my boys on the hills, tors and fells of Dartmoor, Bodmin Moor and the Lake District. There have been 67 walks over some 375 miles in…
As I reached my last day up here, the weather turns, what a lovely day. Blue skies everywhere. Packing up I headed off to Latrigg to catch the early cloud inversion and sunshine. The views were as good as I’ve ever had up in Lakeland. With good weather comes lots of people and the Gale…
This walk is a classic Lakeland walk, and now I’ve done it I can see why. This specific walk though isn’t the full Coledale Round, that one can include another 3 or 4 fells if you want it to. However I’ve already done Outerside, Barrow, Grasmoor and Wandope, with Hopegill Head pencilled in for a…
Time for another low level walk from my week in The Lakes and this one is a classic and probably my favourite low level walk in the Lakes. I’ve been and done this one once before, on a glorious crisp February day (here). Today wasn’t quite like that but the quality of the views and…
The roman road over High Street is famous around the country for traversing the 828 metre peak of the same name. It connected the two roman forts of Broughton (near Penrith) to Galava (near Ambleside) and took its route due to the marshy and wooded valleys on the normal route, which were prone to ambush.…
Back in the Lakes again for another week of food, drinks, walks, food, walks, drinks and more food. The weather this week wasn’t the best I’ve had up here, only on the last day did it turn into autumn as you would want it and the colours of the trees came out. As it was…
Now the seasoned Wainwright walker will know all about the central spine that consists of 7 Wainwrights, running from Walla Crag to Ullscarf. They will also know, more specifically, about the part from Bleaberry Fell to Armboth Fell and how wet and boggy it can be. I can confirm it is indeed wet and boggy…
